


Right Here Waiting

by Darby_Harper



Series: Mad Mad World [1]
Category: Rammstein
Genre: Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Psychic Abilities, Psychic Bond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-03
Updated: 2017-04-04
Packaged: 2018-10-14 13:07:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 20,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10537071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darby_Harper/pseuds/Darby_Harper
Summary: Life on the road is complicated enough. Drop into the mix a tangled web of emotions, the strain of learning how to live in a world full of "normal" people now that you aren't, Murphy's Law being in effect and falling in love with someone when you can't love yourself, and you have a royal mess that might drive you insane.





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Any similarity between the fictional version of the person portrayed here and the actual person is purely coincidental. This is a work of fiction. This is not an attempt to defame the character of said person on the basis of libel, as the work is FICTIONAL (and NOT an intently false statement created with the express purpose of misleading others about the actual character of said person). All rights reserved.

:::

The world of a touring rock band is a country all to itself, with its own rules, fiefdoms, customs and the like. It’s ever changing, never boring, and for some people, would be too chaotic to deal with even for a few hours. I get to live with it 18, sometimes 23 hours a day, seven days a week and honestly I wouldn’t have it any other way. Especially after the nearly six months of hell I barely lived through not too long ago.

Being a band’s tour physician is interesting to say the least. You’re not only looking after the band, but usually everyone involved with the band from the roadies, to the lighting crew, and so on.  Not only do I bandage up bumps, bruises, and in the case of the band I’m with, the occasional burn, I also play physical therapist, drill sergeant and many times, den mother. _Especially_ that on the days their manager, Emu, is at the end of his rope with the band and leaves them to my “tender mercies.” Luckily for me on those days all I have to do is threaten dire consequences for doing stupid things, such as tying boot laces together, being late for rehearsal, things like that.

It does help that not only am I a very strong, and may I say it, talented telepath, but so’s the band I’m touring with. We’re telepathic with each other, bound on a deeply spiritual level. Top that off with each of us having empathic skills of varying degrees, the ability to heal up from injuries quicker than most people, hard as steel nails and fanglike teeth that thankfully don’t look like fangs, and you’ve seven people that wouldn’t be out of place in a science fiction or urban fantasy story. Oh, add enhanced hearing, eyesight and sense of smell to that list. Yeah, we’re an odd bunch.

But this isn’t a story, this is real life for us till (when, if) the day we die.

Thanks to a crazed madman who kidnapped me, and then the band’s lead guitar player to be used as guinea pigs for his experiments with deadly, mutated viruses, this is our new reality. To save the rest of the band who’d come on a rescue mission, we infected them with the viruses in our blood, not knowing if they would take and at the worst, what they would do to the others. In the end, we walked out of that hell house alive, bruised and battered, while our jailor lay dead behind us. If I hadn’t shoved a pair of butcher knives through his head, the cocktail of drugs and viruses he’d shot himself up with would have killed him within days. The chance that he would survive long enough to hunt us down, most likely leaving a trail of dead and/or infected people behind, was too great. You don’t let a dog infected with rabies go running around your city, right? 

I’m learning how to live with what I’ve become. I’m learning to deal with killing what was once a human being to save my life and the lives of those I care for. I’m learning how to look in a mirror and not be shocked to see a gorgeous woman with scarlet hair, sapphire blue eyes and slightly-too long canines looking back at me where there used to be a nerdy, reclusive workaholic. 

The flashiest thing on me before becoming a “Changeling” as we’ve come to call ourselves, was my elaborate “fallen angel” wings tattoo on my back. I’ve added to my body art recently; now a mermaid twines up my left calf, dolphins and bright tropical fish chasing each other around the mermaid and up my leg to just above my kneecap. I’ve several more tattoos planned but I don’t have the time right now to sit down long enough to get something elaborate done.  

I’ve also gotten both of my ears pierced multiple times, my most recent a tragus piercing in my left earlobe that now sports a tiny diamond earring. Out of all the piercings and my tattoo, that one hurt the worst, and everyone in the band let me know about it, especially Till Lindemann, the band’s lead singer. I came back from the piercing studio to six very annoyed men, one of which was grumpy _and_ annoyed because I hadn’t asked him along. 

“You went by yourself?” Till asked, a hurt look on his face. Everyone else in the band were glaring at him, then at me, all of them gingerly rubbing their left ears where the needle had gone in. “I would have gone with you.”

 “No, I went with Jackie from the wardrobe crew. The guy who pierced my ear is a cousin of hers and she hadn’t seen him in a while. I wanted a new piercing, you were busy and I didn’t have time to wait,” I explained.

  ** _::Did you have to get it in that part of your ear?_** **::** Flake Lorenz, keyboard player and ertzwistile doctor complained. **_::It hurts!::_**

  ** _::I was considering getting my nipples pierced. Stop complaining, Lorenz::_**

I’d made no attempt to keep our wordless conversation on a private, so the rest of the band heard us grousing at one another. At that statement, everyone else in the band but Till slapped their hands over their chests, looking at me in horror. Till sighed and said, “Next time let me know, okay? I’m getting bored with what I’ve got done.”

 Such is life with Rammstein.

 What I _haven’t_ learned yet is how to deal with the tangled ball of emotions between myself and their pretty peacock of a guitar player--- Richard Zven Kruspe, better known to friends, family and loved ones as Reesh. Big, indigo and dark sapphire blue eyes that capture and hypnotize, black as night hair that defies gravity all on its own, body built just _so_ in all the right places, and carrying an aura that’s a volatile mix of innocence, sin and wicked humor. He’s got my heart right in his hands and he _knows_ it.  He’s a charming bastard who hides a fiercely loving, devoted and sweet personality who could snap his fingers and have any woman in his bed in a heartbeat. 

 But he hasn’t. Instead, he’s chosen to flirt, annoy, tease and court me. Any other man would have either given up on a relationship or I’d have given in and gone to bed with them, but Richard is too much of a gentleman to push the issue. For the last couple months we’ve been dancing around each other, me still nervous and shy around him even though we became very close during our time locked away in the basement of my ex-co-worker’s house for close to four months, and like I said, him being the consummate gentleman. It’s a source of never-ending amusement to the few people who know about the two of us, and utter frustration and annoyance for us. I’ve told him numerous times that while I do like him a great deal, he’s free to pursue others, but he doesn’t. It’s maddening but we’re both professionals, so we don’t let it show. Or at least I hope we don’t.

 ::

 I was sitting backstage one afternoon, enjoying the quiet after a morning of listening to explosives go off as the pyro crew ran though the effects with the local fire marshal. It made the shows twice as expensive to put on but it was required in every city the shows were to be done in, so no one complained. It was also a chance for the pyro crew to get a second look-over at things and make sure everything was going to go off as planned. Most mornings, Till was there to watch right along with the pyro crew not only for his peace of mind but also to make sure he would know where everyone was at any given second.  Of course now that we were changed and linked telepathically, the fear of not knowing where everyone was and staying safe wasn’t as intense as it once had been. Still, it was one of Till’s deep-ingrained habits and no one was about to stop him.

 The concert hall was silent, all of the crews that took care of various things having gone to lunch and not due to be back for a couple hours. I had checked over my emergency kit (or as I called it, my e-kit) to make sure it was fully stocked and ready to be used and now I was curled up on a very comfortable sofa, flipping through a medical supply catalog. I didn’t have to stay at the arena during breaks but rather than run back and forth from the hotel a hundred times, I camped out in the main green room. With my laptop, various electronic toys and a good Wi-Fi connection, I was as comfy as if I’d been in my room. Plus, I liked having quiet time to myself to relax and shore up my endurance for the night’s gig. There weren’t as many accidents as you’d think there would be at a Rammstein show but the ones that happened required someone with steady hands and more than a Band-Aid to fix whatever had happened. The worst accident so far on the tour (thankfully) had been when one of the roadies rolled a heavy road case full of lights over his foot and broke three of his toes. I’d splinted and taped them as you can’t put broken toes in a cast, and he was back to work within a couple of hours. By the next time I’d seen him he was wearing the steel-toed boots I’d told him to get so I wouldn’t have to splint and tape the rest of his toes or send him to the emergency room with crushed toes that might need to be amputated.

 The stillness was starting to prod my brain into sleep mode and I found myself nodding over the catalog I was reading more than once. After the third time of jerking myself awake, I stuffed the catalog into my backpack and stretched out on the couch, pulling my lightweight cardigan more snugly over my shoulders and pillowing my head on a hooded sweatshirt I’d borrowed from Ollie Riedel, the band’s very tall, very shy and sweet bassist, several nights back as I’d left my jacket back at the hotel and had gotten chilled after the show. Sleep wasn’t too far off; I’d had a couple of sleepless nights that were catching up with me so I welcomed the extra sleep.

 I woke up a couple of hours later to the feeling of someone staring at me. Cracking my eyes open, I peered through my lashes and saw Richard sitting on the back of the sofa, gazing down at me with a sweet, lovely smile on his face. Blinking sleep out of my eyes, I said, “How long have you been here?”

 “Oh, ten minutes maybe,” he replied, reaching down to push a chunk of hair out of my eyes. I leaned into his touch, savoring the warmth and the wonderful scent of whatever cologne he was using. It smelled like a combination of exotic spices with a hint of sandlewood and wood smoke and it was delicious. “I’m a half hour early. I got done with the few interviews I had and figured I’d be early for once.”

 I sat up, untucking the hem of my cardigan from where it had wrapped itself into the waistband of my jeans and pulled it off. I was cosy and warm for once, which was a blessing as usually the concert halls were chilled to near Arctic levels of cold. My braid was coming down, and as I began to undo it, Richard stopped me and said, “May I?”

 “You sure can,” I sighed, scooting over on the sofa so he could sit behind me to undo my hair. If there was one thing I loved more than anything, it was having someone brush, braid, style or just play with my hair. Richard was a master of it, most likely due to being a single father for so long. He carefully and gently undid my braid, fingers sliding through my hair and sending shivers up my back.

 “Is your fancy hairbrush in your backpack?” he murmured, waiting for me to nod in reply before reaching into the bag and digging around for my brush. I’d winced at paying over a hundred dollars for a fancy, 100% boar’s-hair brush ten years ago but it proved to be worth every penny. I carried it with me and I had to admit, I was spoilt rotten and didn’t like using anything else on my hair.  The shivers going down my back deepened as Richard worked his way from the bottom of my hair up to my scalp, working out any tangles with skillful, tender fingers.  I sat quietly, soothed almost back to sleep by what he was doing. The brushing out would have been enough, but Richard put the brush back into my backpack and buried his fingers in my hair to give me a scalp massage that was up there with what a professional masseuse would do. I tried to speak but the only thing that came out were undignified gurgling noises that made me giggle and Richard hide a snort-laugh in his arm.

 “I’m that good, yes?”

 “Where the hell did you learn how to do this?”

 “Partially being a single dad and partially because I like to have my hair messed with too,” Richard replied, smoothing his hands down my hair and transferring his hands to the back of my neck, where he dug his thumbs into my spine as carefully as he could and began rubbing my neck. I bit back a moan, not wanting to embarrass either of us if there was anyone close by. Instead, I sighed deeply and relaxed into Richard’s fingers, concentrating on nothing more than the feel of his strong, nimble fingers working the stress out of my neck. He’d done this several times for me while we were imprisoned, each time lulling me to sleep with the warmth of his hands on my skin and his quiet, steady presence in my head. 

 “Lilly?”

 “Hmph? Huh?”

 “You started to snore,” Richard whispered into my ear as he slid closer to me and pulled me into his arms.  I couldn’t deny it; I _had_ started to fall back to sleep. Sighing, I laid my head on his shoulder and said, “I’m kinda tired. This rock star lifestyle is catching up to me.”

  ** _::Is there anything I can do for you, sweetheart?::_**

  ** _::Cuddling would be nice until everyone shows up::_**

 Richard settled me against him so we would both be comfortable, tucking his lightweight leather jacket over my shoulders as I laid my head against his broad chest. He brushed a kiss across my forehead, pulled me a bit closer and said, “I could do with a nap myself.”

 We managed to get a good hour and a half long nap in before the first few people on the crew began trickling into the arena. While I couldn’t read into their minds, their mental presence in the “overworld” as I called it, was like a softly ringing bell that woke me up. Richard felt me come around and by the time I was fully awake, he was shifting me so I could sit up without moving too fast and causing a dizzy spell. He smiled a slow, charming smile that had more than a little lust in it and I had to return it with one of my own. I saw his eyes widen slightly and I said into our personal link **_::Maybe if you’re not too tired after the show…::_**

**_::Why do you think I took that nap?::_** Richard purred back, gesturing for me to turn around. When I was facing the other way, he said aloud, “I’ll braid your hair back up, okay?”

  ** _::I think I might keep you::_**


	2. Two

Our plans for the evening were waylaid by the show running late due to a freak thunderstorm that tore through the area and took out the power for several hours. The band had refused to reschedule, even though the schedule was tight. The arena management had been kind enough to let the fans who were already at the arena inside so none of them would be outside when the storm hit. If they hadn’t, I’d have gone and insisted on it. I’d seen more than my share of lightning strike victims when I first began working as a nurse and didn’t want to see any more. 

Thankfully the power came back on, only delaying the start by forty-five minutes. The band ran through the world’s fastest sound check, praying that the pyro would go off as planned. I knew Till was frustrated by everything that had happened; I touched him through the bond and settled him as best I could, not wanting him to head out there and get himself or everyone else hurt in his uncertain temper. He shot me a look across the room and smiled wanly. 

**_::I hate this::_** he murmured to me privately. 

**_::I know sweetie. You be careful, okay? I know you’re upset but be careful, okay?:_** I said.

  ** _::Yes, Mutti. You’d better go see what Reesh is up to, I can feel him grousing all the way over here---thankfully he’s outside somewhere or I’d have to smack him. Funny thing how the change killed his nicotine addiction. Well, in all of us.::_**

 I nodded my thanks to Till then went looking for Richard. It didn’t take long; following our soul-deep link, I found him standing on a tiny balcony of sorts at the back of the arena. He was dressed in his costume, ready to go, with his in-ear monitors dangling around his neck. The dusk to dawn light over his head made his hair shimmer, the blue highlights stark and bright. I stopped to admire him, black leather and silver studs contrasting with his bright red, silk gauntlets pulled nearly to his shoulder, black vest clinging to his chest and the silver buttons shining in the dim light. He was leaning on the low railing that went around the balcony, looking into the night, and when I wolf-whistled softly at him, he turned around, a big smile on his face. Beckoning to me, I went to his side and settled under his arm, resting my head against his chest.

 “Show starts in about twenty minutes,” I said quietly. “And we’re running late on top of that.”

 “Yeah, but we’re not going to let these people down. They’re getting the entire show, come hell or high water,” Richard replied just as softly. “I needed a few quiet moments to myself. This was the only place I could find that wasn’t already occupied or within shouting distance of the fans.”

 We stood together for a few moments, then Richard turned me around in his arms. I didn’t have to be a telepath to know what he wanted; I locked my arms around his waist and lifted my face for his kiss. Kissing Richard was nothing like kissing any of the few men I’d kissed before, and that was before the viruses we’d been injected with did their work. Now I could feel everything he did, hear his thoughts, as he could with me. While it was irritating at times, especially since we were all fumbling through learning how to stay out of each other's heads, right now the world could have ended and I wouldn’t have cared. My back met the low railing, my black polo shirt growing wet from the rain-soaked metal. I pushed everything away save the touch of our lips, the heat between us, the scents of leather, rain-wet pavement, whatever Richard used in his hair to make it spike up so wildly, and the perfume he’d given me as a gift a few days earlier. It was close to what he wore, only mine had more vanilla and sugar in it.

 “Uh, guys? I don’t mean to interrupt...” came Ollie’s voice from somewhere behind us. Richard made a growling sound, deep in his throat and said, “Oliver Riedel, I could kill you right now. But I love you, so I won’t.”

 “Be nice, Richard,” I snickered, smacking his shoulder gently. “You have a job to do, so get going and don’t kill Ollie on the way.” He shot me a look that went from irritated to amused, a good bit of the heat we’d been lost in still sparkling in his eyes. Ollie grinned at me and said, “How we managed not to kill one another before you showed up, I have no idea. C’mon Romeo, we’ve got several thousand people waiting for us.”

 I stayed outside for a bit longer, savoring the cool air and stillness, then took a deep breath and went inside the arena. My shirt, where I’d been leaning on the railing, dried quickly in the air-conditioned backstage area, and was only a little damp by the time I’d put my hair up into a tight bun and shoved earplugs into my ears. I had a tiny place at the side of the stage, out of everyone’s sight but where I could see clearly; I made it to my spot a few moments before the lights went down and the opening music and sound effects began. Hopping up onto the stool I’d borrowed from the green room, I pulled my link from the boys back to where we were only barely aware of one another, letting the six of them throw their own shared links wide open. Not enough to let the emotions of the crowd overwhelm them, but enough that they no longer needed gestures or shouted words to communicate during the show. I caught Schneider’s eye as he sat down behind his kit; he grinned at me and said **_::Are you the reason Reesh is walking funny?::_**

  ** _::A lady never tells::_** I teased back, winking at him as he popped his ear monitors in and spun his drumsticks in his fingers, readying himself. Then everything went black, the pyro went off, and the show began.

 The show that night had run far past what anyone had estimated, so by the time the band came offstage for the last time, it was well past midnight. The road crew began tearing the stage down the second the boys stepped off the stage, already anticipating a long overnight drive to make it to the next town. I’d felt sorry for everyone in the crew, for their jobs weren’t over till very late on a good night. It was a good thing the next show was in a town only four hours away, so unless Mother Nature decided to unleash her wrath again, we’d be fine. Luckily there were no accidents tonight, onstage or in the crowd. I’d offered to help the on-site medical crews if they got overwhelmed and had my offer taken up several times.

 I probably shouldn’t have boasted about the audience being accident-free, for fate heard what I said. There were two close calls at the next show; one was a guy who took five uppers, drank three cans of an energy drink and had a heart attack, the other was a lady who went into labor two weeks early. Her name was Shelia, and her husband, James, had been shocked that the baby had chosen such a time to decide to be born, but babies don’t always come when you want them to, or think they will. She’d delivered just as the first encore began and had been upset that her husband had missed the end of the show, especially since he was such a fan and had missed the last tour, but all of that was forgotten when the band, fresh off of the stage, had presented themselves in the First Aid room to congratulate the new parents.

 I’d just finished getting Shelia and her new daughter cleaned up when the band showed up, and the second she spotted Paul’s shining face, she turned to me and said, “I’m seeing things, right? That can’t be Paul Landers.”

 Paul stepped over to her, shaking her husband’s hand, then leaning over to drop a quick kiss on the top of her head. Eyes twinkling with their usual mischief, he said, “Nope. We decided to come and meet our newest fan and her parents before they got whisked off to the hospital.”

 Schneider peeked over Paul’s shoulder and wiggled his fingers at the new mother, who returned his wave, if weakly. “Can’t say we’ve ever had a baby born at any of our shows. _Conceived_ , maybe, but born? This is a new one for us!”

 “This is definitely one for the record books!” Richard laughed, joining Paul and Schneider. Ollie was laughing too, peering over their shoulders to see the baby. “Do you have a name for her?” he said in his soft, gentle voice.

 “We have a couple,” James said, smiling fondly at his wife and daughter. He stroked his wife’s hair, a glossy fall of white-blonde that could only be natural. She beamed up at him and said, “Our kid is going to have one hell of a story to tell people when she gets older, you know.”

 Flake and Till were the last to arrive, both of them grinning at the scene in front of them. “I thought the security guys were kidding but nope, here you are,” Flake said, joining the throng around the stretcher. He offered his congratulations and stepped aside to let Till get a look at mother and daughter. I felt a pang of melancholy from him; he was thinking of his children when they were newborns. He smiled gently at the baby, who was beginning to fuss slightly and said in his soft, deep voice, “Welcome to the world, little one.”

 “Do you want to hold her?” Shelia said, carefully holding the baby up for Till to take. A smile a mile wide appeared on his usually solemn face as he held out one of his fingers for the baby to grab on to. She peered up at the person who was holding her, making soft little noises to herself as Till gently rocked her from side to side. Paul asked if he could be next, and eventually everyone in the band got to hold the little one. She was starting to fuss a little by the time she came around to me; I deposited her in her father’s arms before she could build up a head of steam and cry.

 “I think the name we decided on last week will fit her perfectly, James,” Shelia said, settling her daughter back against her chest. James smiled, stroking the baby’s petal-soft cheek and replied, “I think so too.”

 I stomped on the comment that they’d better not give their newborn daughter a Rammstein-themed name, knowing how much that annoyed the band, especially Till. Shelia looked down at the baby and said, “What do you think of Belinda Elizabeth, kiddo?” The baby gurgled and smiled, seeming to accept her name as good, something she could live with. James leaned down and kissed mother and baby just as the ambulance crew arrived to take everyone to the hospital to be checked out. With a round of good-byes and good wishes, the little family were whisked away, leaving us standing in a suddenly empty, overly-loud room. The emotions that were running through everyone in the room were more than I could take, so I excused myself and ran for the ladies room down the hall. I locked myself in, curled up on the floor and cried, not only for my friends and lover and their feelings of homesickness, but for myself.

 Thanks to the viruses and the damage from the miscarriage I’d had, I would never be able to have a baby. I’d never seriously considered it, but in the light of what I went through, having that choice torn away from me was heart-rendingly painful. The doctor I saw while I was in the hospital after we’d been rescued from Neal Williams' madhouse ran multiple blood tests, scans and did exploratory surgery to make sure she was right, but in the end she only confirmed what I’d feared; my “lady plumbing” (as I called it) was damaged beyond any kind of repair. I sadly signed the consent to surgery form the day before Richard woke up from his semi-comatose state and went through with the hysterectomy. I knew not even my accelerated healing abilities would fix the damage but it would help me heal a lot quicker. I hadn’t told Richard yet; I hadn’t found a time that I felt comfortable enough to tell him. Maybe never. All he knew was that I'd been in the hospital almost as long as he had; the story I'd told him was that the doctors kept me that long due to my being drugged up, beaten and assaulted.

 I left the arena long before Richard was halfway done cleaning up from the show and headed to the hotel where I spent an hour scrubbing myself down in the shower and having another crying fit. A couple of sleeping pills helped me off to sleep, else I’d have been up all night, and they also did a good job in keeping the nightmares away.

 When I woke up early the next morning, Richard was curled around me, nose buried in my hair and one arm trapping me to his side. He stirred awake when I moved his arm off of me; blinking sleepily up at me he said, “You were so sad. I didn't want to bother you but...I didn't want you waking up alone.”

 “Thank you sweetheart,” I replied, snuggling back into his embrace. “Can…can you stay with me a bit longer?”

 “I cleared my calendar just for you,” Richard replied, kissing my forehead. “Go back to sleep, love. I’ll be here when you wake up. I promise. I won’t let the darkness get you.” I was so glad to drift back to sleep again in those protective, loving arms for just a bit longer that when I finally woke up, I felt a good deal better. Richard was already packed and ready to go, so he left me to do my own packing, promising me that he was only a phone call or text message away if I needed him. I wasn’t too far behind him; after making sure that my e-kit was back in order and ready to go, I stashed it on the band bus and made my way to my little bunk, quickly changing from last night’s clothes into my favorite yoga pants, oversized t-shirt and tattered, old sneakers.

 While it wasn't the usual custom for anyone on the crew to travel in the same bus as the rest of the band, I’d agreed to travel with the boys only after a long, heated argument in which I’d discovered that Paul, despite being considered the happiest person on the planet, had one hell of a temper and would _not_ take no for an answer if he thought you were doing something really stupid. I’d tried to argue that if I wasn’t with the crew, I’d have nothing but trouble from them because I’d be seen as a glorified groupie. _That_ argument got shot down within seconds, and my second argument that I was a grown woman and could drive myself perfectly well to each show was shot down even quicker with a “What if you get lost? Stuck in traffic? Have a breakdown?” from Flake, Ollie and Paul. I’d consented at last but insisted on not sharing a bunk with Richard, saying, “He snores. I need my beauty sleep.”

 I wasn’t the first on the bus; Flake hadn’t been feeling so hot the night before so he’d taken my advice and headed straight to bed as soon as he’d cleaned up, and he'd obviously decided that more sleep on the bus to the next venue was in order as well. I checked in on him briefly; he was out like a light and wasn’t as pale as he had been the night before. The man could sleep through World War 3 and my gentle brush of a hand over his hair didn’t disturb him a bit.

 I crawled into my bunk and wrapped myself in a bright pink, faux fur blanket that could have been made from Till’s pink jacket two tours back. I’d found it in a dollar store right before I left for the tour and had fallen in love with it. It was very fuzzy and was just right for the fluctuating temperatures in the tour bus. I’d intended to pick up where I’d left off reading my copy of “Ready Player One” but my eyelids were growing heavier by the second. I gave up after dropping the book on my nose for the third time, snapped off the tiny nightlight over my head and fell asleep.

 


	3. Three

The next thing I knew, Paul was gently shaking me, calling my name softly verbally and psychically. I blinked, confused, not knowing where I was; Paul smiled down at me and said, “Wake up sleepyhead, we’re here.”

“Where’s here?” I mumbled, burying myself back into my blanket. Paul sighed and tugged it away, saying “The next tour stop, kiddo. Come on, you can sack out in the green room while we run through sound check. You must have been tired, Richard came to wake you up twice and you kept on sleeping. Plus you bit his fingers when he tried to poke you in the shoulder to get you to wake up.”

 “So you got elected to wake me up? You poor thing,” I muttered, prying my eyes open and forcing my reluctant body into a sitting position. Paul only laughed and handed me a bottle of Coke, saying, “I bring presents. Please don’t bite my fingers off, I need them.”

 “You’ve just saved your fingers,” I said, returning Paul’s infectious grin. After drinking half the bottle in one go, I felt awake enough to brave the rest of the world. I put my hair into a tail as I finished the soda and retrieved my sneakers from under my bunk, then with a deep sigh and a quick prayer to Whoever or Whatever took care of children and rock stars, went out to face the world.

 By the time sound check was over, I was ready to lie down in front of the tour bus and let it roll over me. Everything that could go wrong went wrong, from amplifiers blowing out, to Richard’s roadie forgetting which guitar he used for “Ich Will,” to Schneider’s snare drum head blowing out in the middle of “Links 2-3-4.” The worst of it was one of the fire-waterfall effects, it wouldn’t go off no matter what the pyro crew and Till did. To top all that joy and happiness off, Flake was developing a whopper of a head cold. Everyone was miserable, snappish and short with one another and I didn’t blame any of them a bit. Instead, I kept off to the side of the stage, keeping an eye on everyone in the arena, trying to visualize a ‘blanket’ of calm over the place. I was doing the best I could do when Till snapped at Paul, who wasn’t quick enough to move out of the way as he stomped across the stage. The harsh syllables of Till’s cursing so loud he could be heard over Schneider’s drumming broke my concentration; I peered around a girder to see Paul toe to toe with the irritated singer, both of them growing at each other, the air simmering with the impending fight. Any other time it would have been funny, seeing Paul glaring up at Till like a Corgi trying to take on a Great Dane.

 “Shit, shit, _shit!_ ” I heard Schneider curse as he tumbled out from behind his drum kit, hitting the stage floor behind Paul in one mighty leap. Flake had come down from his keyboards the second the argument began and was behind Till, arms folded and waiting for the explosion. Ollie and Richard stood to the side, both of them looking shocked and unsure what to do, the argument had come on so quickly.

 “Get. Out. Of. My. Way,” Till hissed, looming over Paul like a thunderhead. “You do that during a show and we’ll both get torched. You know better, Paul.”

 “Fuck you sideways, Lindemann,” Paul snapped back, guitar slung over his back and fists clenched so hard his knuckles were turning white. “I didn’t mean it. And I know better. Don’t take your anger out on us just because the pyro doesn’t work. Let the pyro crew work on it; it’ll be ready to go by show time.”

 Till said nothing for a very, very long and tense time. I shot a look at Ollie, who shook his head minutely as if to tell me to stay out of it. Every inch of my being wanted to reach down the link and settle their tempers, but I stopped myself. Influencing people’s emotions was tempting, which would start me down a path I had no intention of going down. I bit my lip and resumed hiding, hoping that something, even a physical fight, would happen before the tension in the room grew too high.

 Finally, I heard Till blow out an exasperated breath and say, “I’m sorry Paul. You’re right, I shouldn’t take being upset out on you.”

 “That’s okay. Let’s call it a day, huh, folks? I’m getting hungry and we need to clear the stage anyway,” Paul replied. I stayed hidden until I knew the coast was clear and sneaked into a nearby unused room to give the band some time without anyone from the outside bothering them.

  ** _::You around anywhere, Lilly?::_** Flake’s voice feathered through my growing headache. **_::Sorry you had to see that. Par for the course right about now::_**

  ** _::I’m in a break room, I think. Got a headache coming on; I figured I’d leave you guys alone for a while. Is anyone bleeding or dead? ‘Cause if not, I’m going back to the bus and closing my eyes before my head explodes::_**

  ** _::We’re fine. Do you need anything?::_**

  ** _::Thanks, but no. I’m getting sick to my stomach as it is, I think an hour’s nap will work. You doing all right?::_**

  ** _::Whatever that antihistamine you gave me is doing wonders. I don’t feel like I’m drowning in my own snot like I did when I got up this morning. I’ll leave you be and tell Richard where you are. He was worrying you’d run away after that little incident:_**

  ** _::Flake, my dear, I’ve been screamed at by surgeons with the world’s biggest God complex, you would not believe. I’ve had gang members in my face, waving a gun and telling me if I didn’t do something to save their friends, they’d shoot me. I’ve even been smack in the middle of a multiple car trauma call. A pissing contest between Till and Paul’s nothing::_**

 The show went off without a hitch, thankfully. I stayed in an unused dressing room, still nursing the dregs of my headache with an ice pack over my eyes and a heating pad on the back of my neck. I’d taken enough aspirin to ruin my kidneys and my stomach was complaining about it loudly, so I’d chomped down a handful of antacids before lying down with the ice pack and heating pad. The headache was nothing more than a memory when a lightning bolt of red rage tore through my head. I was on my feet and running for the door before I could think of what I was doing, heading down the short hallway to the big conference room that had been set aside for the post-show meet and greet. The rage was so powerful and hot, meaning it could only come from six highly upset Germans. Then I heard the yelling; someone was screaming Nazi slogans at the top of their lungs.

 If there was one thing that still set my boys’ blood to boiling, it was an idiot like this showing up and shooting their mouth off. They laughed it off, publicly, but Richard had told me more than once that even after well over twenty years, he was still hurt and angered by people that insisted Rammstein were nothing more than a younger generation of Nazis. After seeing one incident myself and reading about it on a couple of fan forums, I could sympathize with them. Heaven only knew how I’d react; I’d probably punch first and ask questions later if it had been me in their shoes.

 I hit the door a second before Emu and what seemed to be half of the arena security people did. We shouldered our way through the clump of people nearest the door to find Richard being held back by Ollie and Till while he shrieked in the face of a middle aged, slovenly man in dressed in faded fatigue pants and a faded forest camo shirt a couple sizes too small. He was your stereotypical racist redneck, and it was obvious he wasn't there for the music.

 Richard’s anger was so strong and chaotic I staggered back a step, forcing an iron control over myself before I went over to the asshole that was hurting “my boys” and tore him apart with my hands. I dug my fingernails into my palms, thankful that I’d found a tough, paint-on, rubbery material that all of us ‘Changelings’ painted along the edges of our nails so we wouldn’t tear holes in ourselves, shred guitar strings and the like. I would have torn my hands clear to the bone if they weren’t treated but as it was, I could feel the heat of the dig marks blooming in my palms.

 “You ignorant, mouth breathing, inbred mother _fucker!_ ” Richard screamed, pulling against Ollie and Till’s grip, dragging them halfway across the floor. I saw the strain in their faces as they held their ground, knowing that they were losing their grip and the consequences if they did. “How dare you come in here and shoot your mouth off like that and ruin the evening for everyone else? I swear to God, if I could, I’d take you out in the parking lot and _beat_ the stupid out of you!”

 The moron was backed into a corner, gaping at Richard, who was almost free of Ollie and Till's clenching hands.. You could read the confusion on his now-pale face as clear as a book, mingling with the leftovers of his liquid courage that had prompted him to voice his opinions in front of the band and everyone. He stared at Richard for a second, trying to come up with something to say, and at that point I took a breath and snapped into his head, **_::Settle down, Kruspe! You can scream at him all you like but you’re not going to change his mind and you’re going to give yourself a headache. Cool your jets::_**

  ** _::No! Christ on a pogo stick, Lilly, I am sick and tired of this shit! I’m tired of these stupid meet and greets where one person out of how many has to pull this stunt. It’s happened several times this tour and I have had it. Ollie, Till, let me go so I can beat this shitstain into the ground!::_**

  ** _:: Richard. Settle down or I’ll drop you in the toilet::_** Paul said, lending some of his mental strength to mine, forcing Richard to relax a tiny bit and step away from the man he'd been screaming at. **_::Let Emu and security take care of him. There’s thirty other people here who’ll make up for one of him. Come on, Reesh, she’s right. You’re going to give yourself a screamer of a headache that a night of wild sex with Lilly won’t cure::_**

 I smothered a burst of hysterical laughter at Paul’s dry comment, turning it into a cough. Till and Ollie met my eyes over Schneider’s shoulder and I nodded; carefully pulling my enraged sweetheart back to a nearby sofa and standing in front of him. Security hustled the man out of the room, muttering threats as they left the room. No one moved or even breathed for a second until Paul said, “Well. That’s over. Where were we?”

 It took the fans gathered in the room a few moments to get their courage up to approach any of the band. Finally, a woman with the usual concert uniform of black from head to toe stepped bravely up to Flake, extended her hand and said, “It’s a pleasure to meet you. You all put on a great show tonight.” That broke the ice at last, and before long everything was as back to normal as it could be. I stayed with Richard for a bit, making sure he’d cooled his temper and wasn’t going to bite anyone’s head off.

 “Do you want me to stay here a bit longer?” I asked softly, perching myself on the arm of the couch he was sitting on. “I can, if you want.”

 “If you don’t have anything to do, yes, please,” he replied just as softly. Our eyes met and I smiled my biggest smile to him, waiting to see his usual cocky grin replace the snarling rage on his pretty face.  Once he did, I patted him on the shoulder and said, “Go have fun. I’m going to sit here and watch you guys flirt with the lovely girls and boys.”

 “Pfft. As if I’d look at anyone else, after you,” Richard teased, hauling himself up from the couch and joining the rest of the band. Till turned at the sound of his footsteps and pulled him into the little huddle they’d made near the door, talking to the fans that were lucky enough to be invited to the meet and greet. And as I’d told Richard, I sat back and watched them work their magic on the tiny crowd, amazed as always at how polite and friendly they could be, even after giving their everything on stage.

 Emu had returned from his errand and made his way over to me, holding out a glass of soda for me. I thanked him and scooted over to give him some room. He ran a hand over his head and muttered, “I was tempted to let Richard have at that asshole and damn the consequences.”

 “You’re not the only one,” I replied. “On behalf of every American Rammstein fan, especially those of us with half a brain, I apologize for that idiot and people like him.”

 “No need to apologize. We get this crap a few times on every tour but this one, the crazies have come out of the woodwork. If it’s not someone like that, it’s the few hyper-obsessed fans that show up and make trouble for the band. Those are the worst. I feel sorry for them but at the same time, I can’t fathom how someone could fixate on a celebrity to the point that they go insane.”

 A shudder went through me as the memory of one of those fans came back to me. The poor woman had a serious crush on Till to the point that she was convinced she could persuade him to marry her. She’d thrown herself over a metal barrier at him at the beginning of the tour, breaking several ribs and getting kicked out of the show. I hadn’t seen her since, but I kept my ear to the ground and had heard she’d attended several shows after that but hadn’t been allowed close to the front of the stage, much less anywhere else. The sheer amount of blind insanity coming from her had made me run for the bathroom to throw up; it was far too much like Neal’s for my liking. I’d had several bad nightmares that night, waking Richard and half the hotel floor we were on screaming my head off. I never wanted to feel that madness ever again if I could help it.

 “I’m sure a psychology major in college would find enough on obsessed fans to do their thesis on,” I said after I’d drained my soda. “One fandom alone would do, you know?”

 Emu sighed and nodded. “I can’t wait for this day to be over. It’s been one disaster after another and that was before three o’ clock. You wouldn’t happen to have anything in your doctor's bag that’ll kill a headache quicker than something over the counter, would you?”

 “I certainly do,” I said. “I’ll go get it and you stay here. I can tell your head is going to pop, mine was threatening to do the same earlier.”

 I ducked into the spare dressing room I'd been using and found my e-kit locked away in one of Richard's road cases. Pawing quickly through the contents, I found the little bottle of acetaminophen with a chaser of codeine I’d gotten for my own headaches. As I put the case away, a small piece of folded up paper fell out from under something and I hesitated, not wanting to pry into Richard’s life. I picked it up, carefully, and had to blink back the tears when I saw his scrawling handwriting on the page.

  _“Lilly:_

  _I can’t give you the moon and the stars, but I can give you my heart, for always, if you’ll have it.”_

 “Oh my God,” I sobbed, collapsing onto the floor, the note crumpled in my hand. “No, Richard, you don’t mean that, you don’t want that…”

  ** _::Lilly? What’s wrong, what happened?::_** Till yelled to me **. _::Where are you and why are you crying?::_**

 I couldn’t answer him. I curled up into a ball and sobbed my heart out, not noticing when Till came barging into the green room with Richard and Schneider hot on his heels. He pulled me up and hugged me to his chest, telling Richard to shut and lock the door, and Schneider to grab a chair and quickly. I hung onto Till, choking on my tears, trying to tell him I was all right when it was as plain as day I wasn’t.

 “Lilly, what’s wrong?” Schneider asked gently, putting his arm around my waist and joining in the hug. Richard stood at his shoulder, plainly scared and wanting to comfort me but not knowing if doing so would make things worse. Till finally reached over and grabbed Richard by the arm, dragging him over to me. His arms joined Schneider’s around my waist and between the three of them, got me calmed down enough to where I was shaky and nauseated, but no longer crying. I still had the note balled up in my hand and when I tried to shove it into my pants pocket, Richard caught me and pried it out of my fingers. I hid my head against Till’s shoulder, not knowing what to say. Finally, I gathered up my courage and croaked, “It fell out of your road case. I was getting some stuff for Emu’s headache and that fell out.”

 “Schneider, Till, could you leave us alone for a bit?” Richard asked softly.

 “Sure. We’ll be nearby if you need us,” Schneider said as he helped Till transfer me into Richard’s warm embrace. Once they were gone, I buried my face in his chest with a choked off sob. “I’m sorry Reesh, I didn’t mean to pry, it was an accident…”

 “Shh. Shh, baby girl, it’s okay. You weren’t prying at all. Shh…”

 “You don’t want me that way. I’m broken and I can’t be fixed. I got you in trouble and almost killed. You and everyone’s lives have been changed and no one really got a say in things. I…I can’t have kids anymore, even if you wanted them. I’m nothing and no one compared to the women you’ve been with.”

 “Don’t tell me what I want and don’t want, Lilly Bailey. Don’t tell me you’re too broken to be fixed. I’m not dead and yes, we went into that virus exchange with our eyes open. All the good stuff the change did outweighs the annoyances and all the stuff we’ve had to learn just to function around people. As far as kids, I’m content with the ones I have. You said once any kid you had would be planned and if you’d wanted one, I’d have happily gone along. But if you can’t, that’s okay. You’re nothing like anyone I’ve been with, and that’s why I’m in love with you,” Richard said, walking backwards until his knees hit the armchair Schneider had gotten for me. He sat down, settling me into his lap with my face buried in his neck. I closed my eyes and shook, overwhelmed by his words and by the waterfall of emotions he was desperately trying to keep from becoming more than he could handle. I could feel him trembling and the warmth of his tears sliding down my hair; Richard honestly didn't want to lose me and he loved me more than anything else in the world.

 I knew it would be a hard road, being with him, but I was sick and tired of carrying such a burden of guilt, shame and fear around I wanted to let go of all the wrong things I’d been taught, everything I’d been forced to feel, and I wanted…I wanted to drop all of that bullshit and start over. I wanted to leave my fucked up past behind I wanted to let myself fall in love with this wonderful, silly, cocky, arrogant and sweet man that held me as carefully as he would a new-hatched bird.

 Looking up into Richard’s beautiful, tear-filled blue eyes, I whispered, “I can’t give you the moon and the stars either, but my heart is yours if you’ll have it.”

 And I kissed him with everything I had, losing myself at last in his arms, his warmth and the sweetness of knowing I was never going to be alone again.


	4. Four

“So. I guess we have some plans to make, Lilly-love?”

I was curled up in Richard’s arms, head against his sturdy shoulder as we lay in the quiet, dim warmth of our shared hotel room. I was still jittery with nerves from earlier that evening but they were slowly fading away the longer my beloved cuddled me. I raised my head up from his shoulder, saying, “Yeah, I guess we do. Where do we start?”

“Well,” Richard sighed, pulling a thick hank of my hair from the braid I’d left in and began to carefully pick it apart, hair by hair. “You’ve never told me how you feel about marriage, living together, any of that stuff. Do you want to keep your house or get rid of it and move into mine here in the States, or do you want to live in Germany full time? Whatever you want to do, I’m okay with.”

“For the marriage versus living together part, I really don’t care either way. As long as we love each other and there’s some way for us to take care of the other if something bad happens, a piece of paper doesn’t matter to me at all,” I said.  “As for the residence thing, yeah, I think I’ll give up my place. It’ll sell quickly because the housing market is good right now and I did a ton of renovations to the kitchen and master bath last year. And living in Germany…wow. I’ve never been out of the country in my life. I thought about moving to Canada when I was younger but…wow, Reesh. That’s…you mean living with you?”

 “No, I thought you’d live out with Till on his farm,” Richard said, poking me in the ribs. “Of course I meant with _me_! You’ve seen pictures of my place and you liked them but if you don’t we can always find something else.”

 “Oh, I like where you live in Berlin. I’m not tied to city living or country living, just as long as it’s a decent, safe neighborhood,” I said, going back to playing with Richard’s hair. “I’ve just…I don’t know how well I’ll adjust to things in a whole new country. Moving 500 miles away from my adoptive parents wasn’t easy because save for knowing a couple people at the hospital I worked at through college, I knew nothing and no one in the town I moved to. It was lonely, and I was very depressed for some time.”

 “Well, we all live within an hour or so of each other,” Richard murmured. “So there’s that. Paul’s family will be coming over to see him within the month or so, and my eldest is coming to visit next week, so there’s at least four people you’ll know.”

 “Yeah, but I don’t want to force anyone to liking me just because I’m with you.”

 “Shush. You’ll like Paul’s wife, Arielle. She’s a sweetheart, and so’s their daughter. Who is also named Lily. I’m not sure if Paul’s son will make it over, though, he’s up to his eyeballs at work.”

 I didn’t have any answer to his argument, so I closed my eyes and let my mind wander. The overworld was quiet, everyone that I needed to be concerned with were deeply asleep, and I was starting to get sleepy myself. Richard was heading that way too, although I could tell he was fighting it. Pulling the blankets around us, I said in a tiny voice, “Do you think your daughter will like me?”

 “Don’t see why not,” Richard sighed, snuggling down into the blankets with me. “You’re nothing like any of the women I’ve been with that she’s met, you’re smart and you’re independent. Don’t worry, baby. You’ll give yourself an ulcer.”

 “God, I hope so,” I sighed. If there was one thing I’d always dreaded, it was the idea of being with someone who had kids, grown up or not. I wasn’t about to pretend to be someone I wasn’t just to make a good impression on Richard’s daughter, which would be a recipe for disaster. With that in mind, I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep, hoping I wasn’t jumping into a bad situation with both feet.

 ::

“ _Guten Abend_. Are you Lilly Bailey?”

 I had my hands full of various sizes of gauze bandages and was deep in concentration trying to figure out what needed replaced and what I didn’t need any longer when a woman’s voice, strong with a Berliner accent,  broke my concentration. I looked up and saw two young women standing in the green room doorway, both tall and elegant, one with gorgeous dark hair and the other with a mane of glistening, curly, wheat-gold hair. “Yeah, that’s me,” I said, putting the packages I held back into the cardboard box they’d been stored in and got up from my seat on the lone couch. “What can I do for you?”

 The brunette said something quickly in an undertone to her companion, who nodded back and said, “We’re Richard and Till’s daughters. Till doesn’t know Nele is here with me, it’s a surprise. I’m Khira Li, and this is Nele.”

 In the few seconds it took for me to cross the room to greet Khira Li and Nele, I could tell exactly whose daughter was whose. While they shared the same height and basic bone structure, Khira Li was Richard through and through, from her dark blue eyes, to the way she held herself and she had her father’s impish grin. Nele had Till’s sea-glass greeny-blue eyes, his slow, shy smile and that same air of almost-melancholia that Till carried around no matter what. For all that they shared the same mother, they were unmistakably Till and Richard’s daughters. I shook their hands, briefly, not knowing how to greet them and said, “Richard told me you were coming to visit, Khira Li, but I take it no one knew Nele was coming?”

 “Nope, I wanted to surprise _Vati_ ,” Nele replied, following me as I led them to the tiny sitting area I’d taken over as a workspace. I’d left two soft armchairs empty in case someone showed up and was glad I’d kept my mess-making to a minimum. She and Khira Li sat down across from me, shrugging off the lightweight jackets they’d worn on the plane and getting comfortable.

 “Can I get you ladies anything?” I asked, pausing in front of the large fridge that Catering had delivered that morning. “We’ve got a little bit of everything here.”

 “Water will be fine,” Nele replied, with Khira Li agreeing. I passed out the water, took my place on the sofa and said, “I hope your flight over was a good one. I’ve been told international travel can be an awful mess.”

 Khira Li smiled at me, saying, “Even if you’re prepared for anything to happen, there’s always something that pops up at the last second. I can’t believe we got through United States Customs so quickly; the last time I was here I was stuck in line for well over an hour.”

 Nele nodded before taking a sip of her water. “I’m surprised as well. _Onkle_ Reesh told me that when everyone flew over here to start the pre-tour rehearsals, he was in Customs for well over two hours and so was _Onkle_ Schneider.”

 “It’s a nightmare for sure. How long are you two going to be here in the States?”

 “I’m only here for a couple of days,” Nele replied, twisting her hair into a knot and pushing a wooden hair stick through the bun to hold it back. “My grandmother Lindemann has my little one with her for a week and I came with Khira Li to keep her company. Plus, I haven’t seen my dad in a month or so and wanted to surprise him.”

 “And go shopping while we were here,” Khira Li said, poking her half-sister in the ribs. Nele poked her back, blushing, and nodded her head. “Okay, yes, I also came over to shop. I’m almost as bad as your father, Khira Li!”

 “They’re out doing interviews right now and should be back here by three o’ clock,” I said, checking the latest itinerary that was fresh off of the tour management office’s printer. “That’s about an hour from now. Do you two want to go wander around the city? I can go with you if you want.”

 “No, that’s fine,” Nele replied after looking at her half-sister for confirmation. “It’s not that long of a wait. If you don’t mind, we’ll stay here and out of your hair, you looked like you were really busy when we came in.”

 “I don’t mind and I wasn’t that busy. Just trying to keep ahead of things,” I replied. “Better to be over prepared than under prepared, I always say.”

 “Dad told me you were a nurse?” Khira Li said. “How did you end up working for the band?”

 I was so glad that my need to be prepared for any eventuality to the point of near paranoia had prompted the seven of us and Jack backing us in case we needed someone with credentials and contacts to formulate a decent almost-lie that would hold up under even the strongest scrutiny. “I met Richard through a friend of mine. He’s a cop in the city I’m from and when the company I used to work for went under earlier this year (which it had, Vis-Tek had gone bankrupt shortly before the tour began, partially from loss of patents and partially from the IRS going through their accounts and finding huge mistakes and shady accounting. I’d been offered a tidy sum not long before that and had taken it without a shred of guilt). He knows Ollie through the online gaming community and when the job as tour doctor came open, I was asked if I wanted it. I’ve worked in a hospital or lab setting ever since I graduated and I thought, what better way to see the world?”

 Both of the women laughed and agreed that there wasn’t a better way that they could think of. “But it’s not all sunshine and roses, is it?” Nele asked, accepting another bottle of water from me. “I know my dad and even though he’s careful with the pyrotechnics, there’s always something that can go wrong.”

 “True, but he’s cautious of what he’s doing,” I said, wishing like mad that I could tell Nele and Khira Li the truth about their fathers, that the fear of getting hurt badly wasn’t as big of a deal as it once had been, among other things. “I’ve had more injuries coming from the road crew and a couple months back I actually helped deliver a baby girl who decided she wasn’t going to wait till after the show was over to make her entrance!”

 “That’s right!” Khira Li laughed. “Dad called me that night and told me about that!” Nele snorted and said, “Conceiving a baby at a Rammstein show, I can understand. But having a baby in the middle of the show? That’s wild.”

 “You don’t know the half of it. The best part was when everyone in the band showed up right after the show, didn’t bother to shower or change out of their stage gear, to see the baby. It was….well, it was cute. That little girl will have some stories to tell when she’s older!”

 The hour passed quickly as I slowly got past my shyness and talked with Khira Li and Nele. They swapped stories of their lives growing up with famous fathers with me, while I told them about some of the more interesting things I’d done when I worked in the hospital. We were laughing over a story Nele was telling about her father when a gossamer touch brimming with love and affection went through my nerves. Without blinking an eye, I said _**::You’re back, eh? There’s a surprise waiting for Till in the green room::**_

  _ **::You gonna tell me what it is?::**_ Richard said, humor flavoring the communication between us.

  _ **::Nope. You’ll blab and it won’t be a secret any more::** _ I replied. _**::How did the interviews go?::**_

  _ **::Boring as always, except now we can make fun of people and no one can hear us. Of course we can’t start laughing, it’ll weird out the interviewer. Paul and I had a good interview with a couple guitar magazines and Schneider had an interview with…someone. Can’t remember right now::**_

  _ **:: Anything else?::**_

  _ **::Nah. We’ll be there in about five minutes. Love you, baby girl::**_

 I sent a wave of love and happiness down our link, then let it thin out so I could concentrate on what I was saying. “If my watch is correct, the boys should be getting back about now. Do you want to hide somewhere, Nele?”

 She grinned at me and sneaked off to one of the dressing rooms, pulling the door halfway so she could keep an eye out for her father but still be hidden. Khira Li smothered a laugh behind her hand, saying, “ _Onkle_ Till is going to pop when he sees her.”

 Just then, I felt/heard Richard come into the room. He saw his daughter, dropped the bag he’d been carrying and dashed across the room to grab her in a bear hug, swinging her around until she said, “Dad, put me down, you’re going to squish me! And hurt your back!”

 “I’m fine, darlin’! I’m so glad to see you!” he laughed, hugging her again and turning to me. “I take it you ladies have met?”

 “We have,” I replied, seeing the mischievous twinkle in Khira Li’s eyes that matched her father’s perfectly. She wiggled out of his arms to greet the rest of the band, her hug with Till being almost as long as the one she’d shared with her father. Once everyone was settled, I stood aside and waited for Till’s surprise.

 “How was your flight over?” Schneider asked, leaning back in his chair and cracking his knuckles. “Were you in Customs as long as I was?”

 “Close to it,” Khira Li said, turning to look at Till. He cocked an eyebrow at her, saying, “Yes, kiddo?”

 “I have a surprise for you, _Onkle_ Till,” she said softly, then gestured for me to knock on the door of the room Nele was hiding in. She popped out, a big smile on her lovely face and said, “Surprise, _Vati!_.”

 The look on Till’s face was both comical and touching. He stood up, slowly, obviously blindsided by Nele’s appearance. He walked over to her, a big smile breaking out on his face; she closed the distance between them and hugged her father, hard.  “When did you get here? You didn’t tell me you were coming over!” Till exclaimed, kissing her forehead and hugging her again. Richard was standing right behind him, giving me the most confused look I’d ever seen from him. Once he figured that Nele was the “surprise” I’d told him about, he said _**::I could thump you for that, woman! Not telling me that my Sproutlet was coming to visit?::**_

  _ **::Sproutlet? And of course I wasn’t going to tell you, you have not one iota of the ability to keep your mouth shut. Sproutlet?::**_

  _ **::Long story. She was “Sproutlet” as a kid, Khira Li was “Littleling.” Not that my…erm…our daughters were ever short::**_

  _ **::I’m sure there’s a name for how you, Till and your daughters are related::**_ I said. _**::I’m not sure what::**_

  _ **::Yours is gonna be ‘mud’ if Till figures out that you knew::**_ Richard replied, dropping me a saucy wink.  He’d no sooner said that when Till looked over at me and growled, “You knew about this, didn’t you.”

 “If I say yes, are you going to drop me in the stewpot during “Mein Teil” tonight?”

 “I’ll have to think about it,” Till replied, trying to keep a stern look on his face and his voice solemn but he couldn’t and began laughing. If there was one blessing I was thankful for the most, it was how much Till trusted me. He’d done so from the very second we’d met and I cherished that trust more than anything. He would have walked through Hell and back for me and I hoped that I’d never, ever betray that trust. I’d thought it would make Richard jealous, at the very least, but he’d assured me quickly that there were very, very few people Till put that kind of trust in, and that I was one of those people made me feel wonderful.

 :::

 Nele’s visit with her father and honorary “uncles” only lasted three days; when everyone tried to talk her into staying in the States a few more days she said, “I have a youngster to get home to. He’s probably driving his grandmother up every wall in her house.”

 Till snorted at his daughter’s rueful tone. “I’m so glad you weren’t half that rambunctious. I’d have gone grey much younger than I did. Maybe Fritz inherited the mischief you didn’t use when you were a little girl.”

 “Well, whatever it is, when you get back home you’re going to take your grandson for a few days and let him run wild all over the farm. He’s been asking when his _Großvater_ is going to be home so you two can go fishing at the farm pond. He and I spent a few hours there before I flew over with Khira Li and it was a lot of fun but he said that “Sometimes men have to go off together and do manly things, so you’d better be home soon.” I almost died trying not to laugh at him; he was so serious that if I had laughed at him, he’d be offended for days.”

 Till had shown me picture after picture and video after video of his cherished grandchild; a very intelligent, funny and active little boy. Where his mother and grandfather were somewhat reserved, bookish and quiet, he definitely wasn’t. It was little wonder that Fritz was the center of Till’s universe, with Nele and Khira Li sharing a spot as the runners-up. I had found it weird at first that Till was so attached and so involved in Khira Li’s life, seeing as she was only related to him due to sharing a mother with Nele, but after hearing him talk about how he and Richard had all but raised them together, I understood.

 Khira Li leaned over to me where she sat on Richard’s left side and whispered, “Do you have a minute? I need to ask you something and it’s a bit noisy here.”

 “Sure, follow me,” I said, leading her out of the little dining room in the hotel we were staying in. We’d taken over the small room for an intimate families’-only dinner and the ladies room was a few quick steps up the hallway. It had a lovely little sitting area before you went into the bathroom itself and was quiet, with comfortable chairs against the walls and a changing area with a curtain around it if someone had a baby that needed to have its diaper changed. We sat down in chairs that were farthest away from the door and once we were settled, Khira Li said, “Lilly, it might not be my place but I have to know. How serious are you and _Vati?_ ”

 I wouldn’t lie to her and say we weren’t, not only from my own sense of right and wrong but because Khira Li had the same strong, intense personality as her father. She would be able to sense a lie and didn’t have a scrap of the powers I did as far as I could tell. Without hesitating, I said, “We’re...getting there. Your father is one of the sweetest, nicest and most caring person I’ve ever met. He makes me crazy sometimes when he puts on that whole “rock diva” thing of his but I know it’s not really who he is. He’s been a wonderful friend to me---well, everyone has---but your father was the first person I met when I took the tour physician’s job (that was partially true, Richard had been my friend first before we’d given in to our mutual lust for one another). I don’t know how much about me that he’s told you, but when we met I was going through some really, really horrid times and I wasn’t much for trusting anyone. Guys especially. He’s helped me so much in getting over what I went through.”

 Khira Li’s eyes met mine; I didn’t have to say a word to confirm what she was thinking. Her face went white under its soft, golden tan and she whispered, “Oh my God, Lilly, you weren’t…it’s not my business but…he’d mentioned that when you met, you were getting over something quite bad that had happened to you. He didn’t say what, exactly, but I think I know.”

 I took a deep breath, forcing myself to be calm and detached and not bring anyone, especially Richard, running to see why I was freaking out. “A guy I used to work with got it into his pea brain that we were having a relationship when we weren’t. I tried to be nice, brush him off and not make him mad but he tried to grab me one evening after work and I punched his lights out. The next day he kidnapped me, took me to his house and held me there for close to four, maybe five months. I’m lucky the only thing I came out of that experience with was a serious case of PTSD; he’d planned on killing me. He was a serial killer. He preyed on little kids and there was a good chance he was moving on to adults when the police found out where he lived. They had a couple of clues I was there but nothing really concrete. The only reason I’m alive is he charged the police officer who was the first on the scene and took three bullets to the head.”  Another lie, but a necessary one.

 Khira Li’s face was growing whiter and whiter by the moment. “Lilly, that’s…I don’t know what to say. You’re a very, very strong person to have gone through what you did and survived.  I don’t know if I would have.”

 “You never know how strong you really are until you need to be,” I replied, extending a tiny bit of calm towards Khira Li. She sighed deeply after a moment or so of silence, then said, “I’m being silly. You and Dad are adults and so am I. I don’t need to be sticking my nose in where it doesn’t belong. I just...I don’t want to see him hurt again. He hurts as deeply as he loves, but I think you know that by now.”

 “I understand. I’ll try my best never to hurt him intentionally and if we don’t work out, we’ll always be friends.” I replied. “I don’t make friends easily.  I grew up so sheltered I might as well have been raised in a convent. My parents died when I was young and I was raised by an aunt and uncle who didn’t really want to raise a kid. They did as little as necessary to take care of me but nothing beyond that. I wasn’t allowed to have friends over, I wasn’t allowed to visit anyone unless I was with one of them. They made it quite clear the night before my 18th birthday that they were going to boot me out the next day, so I had to figure out how to everything by myself; things most people took for granted. I muddled through college, nursing school and then graduate school; somewhere along the way I managed to acquire some manners and common sense.”

 “Looks to me like you did just fine,” Khira Li said with a big smile. “So. You’ll try to keep my Dad and my uncles on their toes while they’re out on the road?”

 “You bet,” I said, smoothing my hair back from my face in a nervous gesture I couldn’t train out of myself. Steeling my nerves, for I wasn’t sure how she’d react, I looked her in the eye and said, “Your father’s asked me to come back to Berlin with him and stay. I haven’t given him a yes or no but I will in a day or two. There’s nothing for me here anymore. I don’t have any family or job to keep me here in the States, and if we don’t make it as a couple, well, I can get a job anywhere, being a nurse. I’ll be able to start over and I think I can do that better in Germany than here. Even if I sold my house and moved to another state, I’d still have the past dogging my heels. There’s just too many bad memories here for me.”

 Khira Li stood up, came over and folded me into a hug. Her emotions were right on the surface; I didn’t need to use any of my talent to tell how happy she was for her father and for me. She trusted me with her father’s heart and happiness, and that was all she wanted for him. “Don’t wait much longer, Lilly. Tell him tonight you’ll come home to Germany with him.” I hugged her back and said, “Come on, we’d better get back to dinner before someone comes looking. And yes, I’ll tell him tonight. I promise.”

 Our absence from the party hadn’t been noted, thankfully, so we were able to slip back into the room and into our places without causing a ripple in the conversations around us. I found Richard and Paul arguing playfully with Schneider over the number of pretty girls at a recent meet and greet who had asked them to autograph something more than a photo, leg, arm or hand. By the shade of red Schneider was turning, he was in first place for the number of breasts he’d signed that evening (and was somewhat embarrassed over it), Richard was miffed that he was in second place, and Paul was teasing them both because he was convinced he was in first place and they were both deluded.

 “You can’t count signing across her chest as two!” Paul snort-giggled, wiping his eyes on the back of his hand. “That only counts as one, Reesh!”

 “I thought we’d agreed long ago that it counts as two!” Richard shot back, waving a forkful of cake in Paul’s face. He shot forward, snatched the fork out of Richard’s hand and popped the chunk of cake in his mouth. “No it doesn’t,” he said, tossing the fork at Schneider, who caught it neatly and stabbed it back into the remainder of Richard’s slice of cake. “It counts as one. You’re losing your mind, old boy.”

 “ _Old boy?_ For fuck’s sake, Landers, you’re older than me!” Richard groused, leaning over to snitch what was left of Paul’s slice of cake and depositing it on his plate. He started to wind up and yell, but Schneider, who was laughing so hard at them he was crying, scooped up the plate with its double load of dessert and licked the icing off of one of the slices. “There. I put my germs on it so it’s my cake now. And the rule was signing across the boobs counted as...oh...hi, Lilly! How long have you been standing...Oh. Shit.”

 Seeing three rock stars staring up at me as if I’d caught them with their hands in the cookie jar, their pockets stuffed with frogs and firecrackers did me in. I shoved Richard to one side of the chair he was sitting in, sat down and began howling with laughter. “You boys are going to kill me before this leg of the tour is over!” I laughed. “You should see your faces!”

 Flake, who had wandered over a moment before Schneider had noticed me standing behind Richard, said, “Boobs, Lilly-my-dear, are a very serious thing for us boys. And we never grow out of it. Reesh, you are losing your mind, it counts as two. And since I can do more than chew gum and walk at the same time, unlike some people, I kept count. Schneider, you’ve won the dubious honor of signing the most breasts in one evening as of last night. Congratulations.”


	5. Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Smut ahoy!!

Our little party ended early as Nele and Khira Li had to be up early to make the first leg of their flight back to Germany. As we went our separate ways, Nele caught up to me and whispered, “Khira Li told me that you’re moving to Berlin? That’s great! Does _Onkle_ Richard know?” 

I looked over my shoulder to make sure Richard was still talking to Paul and Ollie and nodded. “I’m going to tell him tonight before we go to bed. I wasn’t so sure about telling him yes or no till the end of this leg of the tour but I can’t keep putting it off forever.” 

“Hey, Lilly? Paul, Ollie and I are going to hang out in Flake’s room for a while and watch the game,” Richard called over to me. I waved to let him know I’d heard him and turned back to talk to Nele. “I’ve got a surprise for him too.” 

“Is it what was in that little bag from the lingerie shop you spent so much time in today?” she snort-giggled.

 “That and a couple more things. It’s a good thing we don’t have to travel tomorrow because when I get done with him...” I replied, wagging my eyebrows. “ _Ahem._ Your father is on his way over. In case I don’t get to see you before you leave, I’m very glad to have met you and Khira Li.”

 Nele hugged me and said, “I’m glad to have finally met you too. Between _Vati_ and _Onkle_ Richard, I feel like I've known you forever.  When you get settled, give me a call and we'll get together and do something, just us ladies.”  Returning the hug, I said, “Thank you Nele.  I’m going to scoot so you can talk to your father, and I have some paperwork to do before I go to bed. Have a safe flight back home.”

 By the time I got back to the hotel room I shared with Richard, the need to fall flat on my face and sleep was having a war with a stack of paperwork as tall as me that needed taken care of, and at the moment the need to sleep was winning. I’d been an idiot not keeping up with the various paperwork I had to do as the tour doctor which included wading my way through several kinds of insurance, both American and German. I was very glad for a fast Internet connection and several search engines; else I’d never gotten through the German forms without tearing my hair out.

 Before I did anything else, I updated the journal on the changes we were still going through. Till’s empathy had gotten so strong he was able to influence several thousand people at one time, which frightened everyone. We’d found that out at one tour stop where the audience was a bit rowdy and itching for a fight; Till calmed them down without breaking a sweat. When he realized what he’d done a few hours later, the panic attack he’d had was almost strong enough to influence people with no talent at all. Drawing on every fantasy novel I’d ever read, plus some things from the dusty corners of the Internet, I helped Till get his talent under control before it went wild and drove him insane. He was already one of the best front men in their music genre; a mere breath of his gift boosted that natural skill as well as his confidence. He still had his moments onstage when you could tell he would rather not be in front of thousands of screaming fans but they were getting fewer and further apart.

 Flake was developing something like psychometry, where he could “read” the past of an object just by touching it. He’d been paging through an old book that Paul had found in a used bookstore one evening not long ago and suddenly yelped and shoved it aside. I’d been standing behind him, reading over his shoulder, and got a burst of _fearpainbloodondeaddeaddead_ from him. Turning, face white and blue eyes wide, he whispered, “Someone touched this book right before they died. How do I know that? Lilly, what’s going on?”

 “Did this just start?” I asked, chafing his cold hands in mine and feeling the residue of what he’d felt falling through my fingers like sand. He shook his head, sending strands of bleached blonde hair wiggling out of the ponytail he’d put his hair in. “No. I noticed it a couple weeks ago when I was going through some stuff at home and came across these music scores that Paul and Ollie got me for my birthday. Whoever owned them before me lived a long, happy life. The books were in a house full of happy people.”

 “This is all new to me too, sweetheart,” I told Flake, who’d stopped shivering and now looked confused. “The only thing I can think of is to be careful what---or who---you touch. Or…I’ve got it.” Closing my eyes, I carefully coaxed the gossamer thin but strong as steel “web” that every one of us had around our psyches to settle around Flake’s hands like micro-thin gloves. He’d still have all the dexterity and feeling he was used to, but it would be harder for any residual memories or feelings to get to him. When I was done, Flake gave me one of his very rare, wide open smiles and a hug. He wasn’t quite as touchy-feely as everyone else in the band could be and I was touched by his gesture. “I think I’m going to start doing my own research on what kind of talents we could be developing. You never know what two people can find if we’re coming at the problem from two different directions,” he said.

 Ollie, Paul, Richard and Schneider weren’t showing any signs of new talents, which after dealing with Till and Flake was a blessing. I made a few more notes, then with a heavy sigh, locked the journal up in my luggage and turned to the paperwork that I’d been dreading. I was glad I’d had the idea to do all my work in the quiet solitude of the hotel’s media center, away from everyone and anything that would pull my attention off of my work.

 Three hours later, I stumbled out of the elevator, lugging my laptop and a rolling file cart full of papers, and began to make the trek to the room I shared with Richard. I had no clue how late he was planning to be out, and the thought of walking up the long hallway to Flake’s room to ask made me groan. I fumbled my keycard out of my jeans pocket, got it correctly through the reader on the first try, slipped into the room...

 ...and was stopped dead in my tracks by the rich, sweet smell of roses, lilies and something with a spicy orange scent. The room was softly lit by what seemed a hundred candles of differing sizes and shapes, the warmth of the flames increasing the heaviness of the scents that were filling my nose. I walked further into the room, glancing about, wondering if I’d fallen asleep over my work and was just dreaming this whole beautiful scene. There was a piece of paper taped to the mirror over the dressing table; I took it down and sat on the edge of the bed, kicking my shoes into a corner to read what was written there in Richard’s half-spiky, half loopy handwriting:

  _“I’ll be back at midnight. There’s some pretties in a box next to your luggage and in the bathroom that I think you’ll like.”_

 What woman could resist that? I jumped off the bed and trotted over to my luggage, seeing a box roughly the size of two shoe boxes set side by side lying on the top of my smaller suitcase. I plopped down next to it and undid the length of silky green ribbon that held the dark grey box closed. Sliding the lid off, I caught my breath as I pulled out a chemise the color of a pure red rose. It had tiny ribbons as shoulder straps, and when I held it up to the light, it was just on this side of see through. Laying it aside, I found a matching robe of the same shade and material that like the chemise would hit right below my knees and was almost see through, and below that a small box made of the same dark grey material the bigger box was made from. I opened it, carefully, and caught my breath at the two sets of gorgeous hoop earrings that were cradled on white velvet. They were made from hair-thin wires of anodized titanium, which gave the metal a gorgeous rainbow sheen, and a few strands of even thinner copper and silver wire braided around them. One set was the size of a penny and the larger the size of a half-dollar coin. They were light as air when I put them on and shone like stars against my red hair. I took them out of my ears, put them back in their box and headed to see what surprises were in the bathroom.

 The bathroom in our suite had a huge Jacuzzi bathtub in it as well as a shower, and at the moment the tub was full of water, tinged blue with something that smelled of vanilla and spices. There were candles on every surface available, and a large basket full of various kinds of hair, skin and bath goodies nestled in the corner of the sink. Opening the ice bucket, I found four bottles of Coke on ice, which made me smile. I’d never been much for alcohol and as a Changeling, it had no effect on me, so I stuck to sodas and tea. Richard knew about my caffeine habit as well as anyone else, especially in the mornings. I was grumpy and sullen no matter how late the day began until I’d had at least half of a Coke or cup of tea.

 “You sneaky bastard,” I said to myself, heading back into the main room. I sat down on the bed, mulling over what to change into, Richard’s presents or my own surprise, finally deciding on the chemise. Pinning up my hair, I went back to the bathroom to take a quick shower and rinse off the sweat and grime of the day before hopping into the Jacuzzi. Once in the water, I sighed happily and settled down into the deepest part of the tub and closed my eyes. Half-dizzy from the perfumes that came from the water, my hair and the body wash I’d used, I smiled happily, feeling every inch a princess.

 The heat from the water was making the loose strands of my hair curly, which Richard liked but I wasn’t so sure about. With my hair loose to curl and hanging down my back, I looked like Meridia from the movie “Brave,” which was cute, but there were times that I didn’t need to be cute. This was however, not the time. Fumbling, I pulled the stray hairs up into the heavy rubber clip that was one of the few things that could keep my mop under control these days, wincing when it closed on a few loose strands and pulled. I gave up on fighting with my hair and curled up in the hot water, floating in its embrace and letting my mind wander.

  ** _::Are you awake sweetheart?::_**

 I came awake slowly, brain registering that I’d fallen asleep in the tub and Richard was being polite and not waking me up abruptly. Without opening my eyes, I said, **_::Not quite. What time is it?::_**

  ** _::Midnight. I promised you I’d be back by midnight, and here I am. I see you like your presents?::_**

  ** _::Very much so. And as you can tell, I’m indulging in one of them right now. Shame to have it all to myself::_** I teased. Richard’s laugh was full of mischief, the heated caress he sent along with it made me shiver all over in the hot water. It wasn’t more than a minute when my beloved peeked around the bathroom door and said, “Well, what do we have here? A mermaid?”

 “Maybe,” I purred, sliding down in the water till my nose touched the surface. While the water was a very vivid blue, you could still see through it quite clearly. I smiled slyly and leaned back in the water, very pleased to see Richard’s eyes rapidly dilate to the point that the pupil almost covered the indigo-cobalt blue of the iris. Oh yes, I had my lover right where I wanted him.

 “Room for two,” I said, gesturing around me. “More than enough room at that.”

 Richard said nothing, just turned his back to me and began yanking his clothes off, flinging them out into the room to land anywhere. I sat back and enjoyed the show, twisting a curl of hair around my finger to keep my hands to myself. He slipped into the warm water, caught me up in his arms and said with a giggle in his voice, “I caught a mermaid!”

 “You so sure about that, pretty boy?” I replied, trying to wriggle out of his grasp and failing when he wrapped his ankles around mine. I gave up and kissed the end of his nose, saying, “Okay, you’ve got me. What brought all of this on?”

 “Aren’t you going to ask me how I managed to pull all of this off?” Richard asked, leaning back against the wall of the tub and pulled me up into his lap, my ankles still caught in between his, our bodies sliding against each other. I bit my lip as a shiver went up my spine; we hadn’t been naked together in a long time, much less having the energy for sex. As it was, we barely had the time or energy for making out, only going as far as teasing kisses and hands caressing and petting before one of us fell asleep. “Okay. How did you pull this off?” I asked, when Richard wasn’t forthcoming with his answer.

 “I’m sneaky. And I had help. I corralled Schneider and Ollie into keeping you busy earlier tonight so I could steal up here and get everything laid out, then while you were hammering away on that pile of paperwork from hell, I had Till pop up here, light the candles and finish putting the bath oil in the tub. If you were any later I even had a Plan B.”

 “Sneaky and smart,” I said, resting my head on Richard’s wet shoulder. We sat in the warm, scented water for a while, then Richard leaned over and began nibbling on the tiny space between my scaffolding piercing and the tiny silver stud below it. He pulled back when he hit metal and grazed his teeth along the side of my neck, letting me feel the merest edge of his inhumanly sharp canines. I tried to take a breath but couldn’t, gripping his hands in mine as I shook from the rising hunger and fear. I didn’t know what was worse, the mindless need to spread my legs for my mate or run screaming for the nearest room with a heavy door between us. I wanted Richard so bad, my very bones hurt.

  ** _::It’s okay beloved::_** Richard murmured. **_::I know you’re scared. Trust me. Let me love you::_**

 With any other man I’d probably be forcing myself to satisfy his desire at the sake of my own sanity but knowing Richard could feel everything I did, I relaxed inch by inch, allowing the fear to flow over and past me, leaving nothing but desire in its wake. Laying my head back on his shoulder, I guided his hands up to my breasts to cup them and let their weight fill his hands while his lips ghosted over my neck, leaving tiny kisses and the merest nip of teeth behind.

 “Want you Lilly-my-love,” Richard sighed into my ear between butterfly kisses.

 “I do too but not in here,” I replied, wiggling ever so gently in his lap to hear him bite off a yelp. “Oh, did I do that?” I purred, slipping out of his grasp and pinning him to the side of the tub with my hands and body. Richard’s eyes were wide, the pupils blown, and he stared at me like I was his dinner. A slow, catlike blink warned me the second before he flipped us about in the water, pinning me to one of the tub walls and kissed me, hard and deep. He pushed my knees open with his hip and ground against me, making me gasp and cry out. I was losing the battle to keep calm and in control every second Richard held me to the wall, his raw, animal desire taking bites of out of any common sense I had left.

 “Out,” I gasped, slinging one arm around Richard’s neck and using the other to push off of the wall. “Floor, window sill, table in front of the windows I don’t care but not in here.”

 “You’re…you’re right. Hang on.”

 Richard stood up, both of us shedding water in a rush as he picked me up and carried me out of the bathroom. Depositing me on the bed, he crawled up my body, licking the water away, those gorgeous indigo blue eyes of his never leaving mine. “I want to see you come,” he said, fingers sliding over my stomach and downward. I tried to speak but couldn’t, tried to protest that I wanted Richard to come before me but the second those talented, tricksy fingers found their way between my legs, I lost my mind and left the rational, intelligent me behind. Every wanton noise I could make, I did. I begged for mercy, I writhed under those wonderful fingers, surrendering to orgasm with a scream that was probably heard six counties away.

 I’d barely caught my breath when Richard hauled me on top of him, pushing inside me with a thrust that burned like fire for a few seconds. Pain became pleasure, fear morphed into desire so strong I thought I was going to die. Caught up in my lover’s mind, experiencing every little thing he did, every silky slide in and out, wet heat that caught and caressed, the building pressure in his spine that spoke of his ending not being far out, I held on and went over the edge again with Richard, his own scream of completion barely masking mine. When the madness passed, we were sprawled out on the bed, trembling from the aftereffects and too tired to wipe the tears out of our eyes.

  ** _::Are you okay?::_** Richard finally asked. **_::Did I hurt you?::_**

  ** _::I’m perfectly fine::_** I said, the last of my tears drying on my skin. **_::Hold me? Please?::_**

 Richard wrapped the damp sheet around us, pillowing my head on his shoulder with the other arm over my waist. “You don’t ever have to ask, _libechen_. Never ever.”

 


	6. Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And yet more smut ;)

Richard and I lay curled around one another, enjoying the afterglow, drifting in and out sleep. Around a huge yawn, Richard murmured, “I hope we don’t have the hotel’s security people waiting outside our door to see who was getting chopped up by an axe murderer.”  I muffled my laughter against his shoulder, imagining the scene.  “Or worse, having Till trying to break down the door because he thinks we’re trying to kill each other. And then him spending twenty minutes apologizing to us while trying to sneak out the door gracefully because he’s _so_ embarrassed.” Richard continued, laughing so hard he began to squeak. The tiny noise was so bizarre-sounding, coming from someone like Richard, it made my laughing fit worse. I slid off of the bed, pulling the sheets with me and rolled into a ball, trying like crazy to keep from howling.

 “What’s so... _squeeek_...funny?” Richard asked, leaning over the bed backwards, so he was looking at me upside down. He was almost helpless with laughter, his bright eyes sparkling at me.

 “That _noise_ , Kruspe! You’re what, six feet tall and built like a damn brick wall, and you’re making a noise that should be coming out of a mouse, not you!” I choked out. “What the hell is that?”

 Richard flipped over and joined me on the floor, winding the sheets around both of us until we were wrapped up tight like babies in swaddling clothes. “I can’t help it. I nearly caused Schneider to fall off of the drum riser one afternoon when we were messing about in sound check years ago. I don’t remember what was so funny but I started squeaking and Schneider was sort-of squatting down next to his bass drum. You know how he is, right? He looked at me and _lost_ it. Paul saved him at the last second before he went flying off the riser but Schneider laid there on the floor for at least five minutes, just dying of laughter. He’d try to stop and couldn’t. I thought we were going to have to dump him in the shower to settle him down but thank God we didn’t. Till came close to peeing himself, Flake and Ollie were in tears for hours.”

 Our laughing fit died down eventually, leaving us both tired but in a good way. Nuzzling into Richard’s chest, I said, “I haven’t laughed like that in a very long time, if ever. And despite the paperwork that ate Cincinnati, some of the shit we’ve dealt with, I’m having a good time.”

 “Same here,” Richard sighed, kissing the top of my head. “I think this has to be one of the easiest tours we’ve ever done.”

 “And I have something to tell you that’ll make it even better,” I purred, running my tongue up the side of Richard’s neck and under his left ear. He shivered and arched his head back so I could nibble my way back down his neck and across his collarbone. I slid my hand down his side, over his hip and wrapped my fingers around his half-hard length, teasing the big vein underneath with the pads of my fingers. The ghostly feeling on my own skin of what he was feeling forced a groan around my teeth that Richard echoed. I kissed him deep and hard, nipping at his lower lip carefully, and murmured, “I’m going back to Germany with you. To stay.”

 “What...Lilly, you’re serious? You’re coming home with me?” Richard gasped. His eyes began to shimmer as he stared at me, the merest hint of tears twinkling in the low, warm candlelight.

“Yes. There’s nothing here for me,” I replied, wriggling out of the sheets and sitting up. “I’ve already started working on my passport, getting my house sold, the necessities. When I got up here tonight and saw the candles, the presents, all this, I figured it was time to tell you what I’d decided. So…yes.”

 Richard sat up, slowly, silver tears sliding down his face. Rising to his knees, he took my hands and kissed them, then my lips. “You...you don’t know how much this means to me, Lilly. Are you _absolutely_ sure? I don’t want you to make a decision that might not be right for you in the end just to make me happy.”

 I didn’t say a word; I dropped all the barriers I had around my mind and soul and stood “bare” to the world, showing Richard how serious I was. That was one thing I’d hammered into my boys’ heads, to never, ever drop those barriers unless there was a life or death situation that called for it. Richard drew a sharp breath through his teeth when what I’d done registered with him; he lifted my hands up so he could lay his cheek on them. “Oh, my beautiful girl,” he murmured, kissing the backs of my hands reverently. “I don’t know what I did to deserve you.”

 “I’m sure someone’s keeping a list somewhere,” I teased, ruffling Richard’s spiky mane and gently tweaking his nose. He pulled me down till we lay stretched out on the floor again, calloused fingers tracing my cheekbones and lips. “You know I’m not the easiest person to live with, right? You know how much of a raging, OCD bastard I can be sometimes, and you know I have a temper.”

 “Yes. But I can be a bitch right back. And if I get deep into a project, I might not come up for air until it’s done, and that might mean days,” I replied. “I don’t take care of myself as well as I should, either. And my self-esteem isn’t all that healthy.”

 “Well, I’ll make a deal with you,” Richard said, leaning up on one arm and smiling down at me. “I’ll make sure you come up for air and take care of yourself, and you’ll keep me from being a bitch. How’s that?”

 My reply was to pull him down with me and kiss him, slow and deep. “I…I love you, Reesh,” I stammered, nervous about saying the “L” word. I’d never said it to anyone, not even my adoptive parents. “More than you could ever imagine.”

 “And I love you, my sweet Lilly-girl,” Richard replied as he stood up, pulling me to my feet. Beckoning me back to bed, I settled at his side, head against his shoulder while he wrapped his legs around mine. Warm, cosy and safe, I closed my eyes and drifted away, the sound of my beloved’s heartbeat rocking me to sleep.

 I didn’t nap for long; I was too energized and happy to sleep more than a half hour. I left Richard snoring quietly away so I could hop in the tub again to enjoy the hot, scented water some more and soak away the few aches I had. I tried to focus on one feeling, one thought, and couldn’t. I was happier than I’d been in a very, very long time and I wasn’t about to spoil it by thinking of anything of great importance for the next several hours.

A gossamer thin ‘brush’ against my psyche that felt warm and smelled of meadow flowers in the rain pulled me out of my reverie---

  ** _::Everything okay?::_**

  ** _::Oh, hey, Schneider. Yes, all’s well. I hope we didn’t wake anyone::_**

  ** _::Not that I know of. So, enjoy your presents?::_**

  ** _::Yes I did and yes I am. Sneaky boys are sneaky. But I’m a bit sneakier::_**

  ** _::You…you didn’t! Lilly, you said yes? You’re coming home with us? Well…with…you know what I mean!::_**

  ** _::Yes I did. I’ve got a lot of shit to do, the biggest being selling my house but I’m determined to be in Germany by the end of the year and no later. To say your pretty peacock princess guitar player is happy is an understatement::_**

  ** _::And he's not the only one. I could feel that something big was going on between the two of you but I wasn't sure what, and I've got better manners than to stick my nose in. So, I’m off to bed. I’m really happy for you two, and I won’t tell anyone. I think you and Reesh should break the news::_**

  ** _::Thank you sweetie. For everything. You know, for a drummer, you’re pretty smart!::_**

  ** _::Yes, and I can count to twenty with my shoes off and twenty one without my pants. Good night Lilly::_**

  ** _::Good night Schneider::_**  I snort-giggled softly.

 “What are you giggling about?”

 I looked over my shoulder to see Richard leaning in the bathroom doorway, hair sleep-tousled and a shy smile on his face. I gestured for him to join me in the tub and once we were settled in the deep end, floating slightly in the water, I said, “Schneider was just checking in. I was telling him for a drummer he’s a pretty smart cookie.”

 Richard laughed ruefully at my comment. “Yes, and he can count to twenty one without his pants on. He used that line on I don’t know how many groupies back in the day and all but a few fell for it. We didn’t…erm…disturb anyone?”

 “Nope. He did say that he sensed something big was going on between us, which tells me that teeny-tiny bond that formed all by itself between the two of you is still active. From what I can tell, for all that it’s barely anything, it’s exactly like the bond you and I share. You two didn’t have something going on way back when, did you?” I said, swishing my fingers around in the water.

Richard blushed and looked away for a moment, then said, “Sorta-kinda. Idiotic, drug-and-repressed hormone-induced stupidity is what it was but yeah, we fooled around quite a bit back in the day. Schneider is one of the hardest people to get to know that I’ve ever met. He’s really cautious about opening up to people, befriending people but once he figures out you’re okay, he just locks in and you can’t get rid of him with a hydrogen bomb. Loyal to a fault, wears his heart on his sleeve, all of that. I guess some of that old emotion for each other hasn’t ever faded. Does it bother you?”

 “Hell no!” I replied, poking Richard in the stomach. “It makes sense, now. And he _is_ pretty.”

 Richard pouted sweetly, which earned him another poke in the stomach followed by a kiss. “I’m jealous. I thought _I_ was the pretty peacock princess.”

 “You are. But you’re not the only handsome boy in this gang,” I purred against Richard’s lips. “I like all of you German boys a lot. But you…oh, sweetheart, you’ve got me heart, soul and everything else.”

 Richard’s answer was a low, deep laugh that woke up the fire and lust from earlier in the evening between us. I couldn’t kiss him enough, couldn’t caress, touch, nip or cling to him hard enough. We managed to dry off before we left the bathroom this time, but just barely. Richard caught me from behind, lightly scratching my neck with his teeth while he pinned my arms between us. I tried to giggle at the sensation but it came out a broken gasp. Richard picked me up, effortlessly, and carried me back to bed.  Once we were there, I fell upon him like a ravenous beast, interspersing kisses with sharp nips, suckling bites that blossomed into bruises quickly, using fingers, teeth and every inch of my skin to drag him to the edge of sanity. Richard was shaking, pupils blown and fingernails digging into the bedding when I leaned over and whispered, “Top…or bottom, pretty peacock?”

 I remembered a second too late that Richard had been a wrestler in his younger days; _he_ obviously remembered everything he’d been taught and then some. I found myself on my back, both of my wrists pinned in one of Richard’s strong, broad hands while the other guided his length into me with a hard, rough push. We both screamed at the sensation of taking and being taken; I had to close my eyes because they were tearing up from the brief stab of pain I’d felt and I didn’t want to alarm Richard. It was going to be quick, hard and painful this time around; we were biting, scratching and suckling at each other’s skin, wherever we could reach. Richard took a handful of my hair and pulled it back, exposing my neck, and sank his teeth in deep. My breath left me in a soundless wail as did any resistance I had; all I could do was cling to his hands and shake. Richard pulled away, a thin smear of blood on his lower lip, and hissed, “I can’t…Lilly…. _ich komme_ …”

 That did it. Heat and fire and ice and joy and…

 …I blacked out.

 


	7. Seven

“...illy? Lilly, are you okay? Sweetheart?” 

My hearing was the first to come back, my ability to breathe deeply second, and my vision last.  I stared up into Richard’s terrified, snow-white face, wondering what in the world had happened. Up until this moment, I’d never passed out during an orgasm. Gone momentarily blind, or even too shocked to speak, but never completely _out_.

 “Oh shit, oh my God, baby girl, you scared me half to death!” my lover whimpered, pulling me up into a tight, hard hug. “If I wasn’t able to be in your head, I’d think I lost you. What was that?”

 “I don’t know, Reesh,” I stammered. “I’ve never passed out during sex, ever. Maybe it’s so good with you my brain just overloaded and shut down?”

 “Damn you woman, don’t tease about this!” Richard snapped, holding me even tighter. “Something’s not right when your partner passes out on you in the middle of their orgasm!”

 “Richard, I’m _fine_. You’d know it if I wasn’t,” I tried to reason with him. “Remember our bond? If I was sick, you’d know it. I can’t block that completely, you know that. Let’s put this down to me being incredibly happy and a sudden drop in blood pressure. Okay?”

 Richard grumbled to himself for a bit, obviously not happy with my suggestion but giving up at last and admitting I was right. “Don’t do it again, please?”

 “I’ll try not to,” I said, wiggling around until Richard loosened his grip on me so I was comfortable, not squished. “Are you okay?”

 “Except for the heart attack you gave me? I’m all right,” Richard muttered, curling around me as if he could protect me from the world simply with his body. Relishing the warmth of his skin, the way his breath felt on the back of my neck and the scent of him, from his cologne to whatever he put in his hair to make it stand up, I closed my eyes and let my beloved keep me safe from whatever monsters, real or imagined, might come in the remaining night.

 By the time I was up and moving the next morning, Richard was fairly vibrating from the need to tell the rest of the band our news.  As I dug through the suitcase I kept my clean clothes in, Richard was chewing the edges of his nails and trying very hard not to fret, which was making me jittery. Sighing, I got dressed, used the ribbon that had tied shut the box my chemise and robe had been in to pull my hair back and shoved my feet into my sneakers. Richard looked up at me at last, nervousness written on every inch of his body and face. He grabbed me into his arms and held me tight, trembling all over. **_::I’ve never been this nervous about anything. Not even when I got married the first time. Why?::_**

  ** _::You want this to work out. Face it, the way you are now, the way I am, this is a whole new world::_**

**_:: I don’t want to fuck this up, Lilly. I want your leaving the States to be the start over you deserve.  I...I want to give you all the wonderful things you never got before. I want you to be happy more than anything else::_ **

 Blushing, I kissed my nervous darling’s soft lips until his shakes died down and he wasn’t looking as if he was on his way to face a firing squad. “Come on Kruspe. Chin up, put that million dollar smile on and shake your money maker. We’ve got good news to tell the family.”

 Thankfully the tiny restaurant was all but deserted this early in the morning. I spotted Ollie immediately with Paul at his elbow; they were discussing something they’d seen on their early morning photography run. Flake had his head propped up on one hand, while he idly flipped through a book that was as thick as the New York City phone directory. He looked up at our arrival and sort-of smiled, then went back to reading. Till and Schneider (who shot me a smile and a wink) were right behind us; I was glad I didn’t have to go hunt them down to tell them the news. I sat down at a table in the corner of the room, catching everyone’s eyes and gesturing for them to join me and Richard.

 “Uhm, I have some news. I’m going to move to Germany at the end of the tour. And I’m moving in with Richard,” I said, staring down at the carpet and waiting for the explosion. Save for Till, who’d hinted off and on that he was sure I was going to move to Germany soon, and Schneider, three pairs of startled eyes met mine, blinked in unison, then locked on Richard, who was whistling idly and looking every inch the innocent bystander. “What?” he asked, head tipped to the side like an inquisitive bird. “I had nothing to do with this. I’m as surprised as the rest of you.”

 Paul grabbed me in a tight hug that squeezed most of the air out of my lungs. “I knew it! I knew it!” he cheered, spinning me around till I begged him to let go before I threw up on him. Schneider caught me before I could fall over and hugged me as well, only a little less tightly. “I’m so happy for you, Lilly,” he said softly, his pretty blue-green eyes twinkling under his thick fringe of black curls. He reached over and pulled Richard into a hug, then surrendered him to the rest of the band to be hugged and teased in turn. Once he and I had been thoroughly congratulated, Flake said, “You’re staying through the entire tour? We’ll have driven you completely mad by then, not just a little bit mad.”

 I settled under Richard’s arm and sighed happily. “Nothing wrong with being a little bit insane.”

 And for now, that was just fine.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the end of these adventures, but not the last of them! Thanks for reading and keep your eyes peeled for more in the Changeling 'verse.


End file.
